Out of the Primitive Part 49

"Yes. Don't you understand? That is why I sent for you--to tell you that."

"But you said--"

"I don't care what I said. It's all different now. I see what I should do. I have failed far worse than you. There on that savage coast you required me to do my share; but always you stood ready to advise and help me. Yet after all that--How ungrateful you must think me!"

"No, never!" he cried. "You sha'n't say that. I can't stand it. You're the truest, kindest--"

"It's like you to say it!" she broke in. "But look at the facts. Did you ever set me a task that called for the very utmost of my strength--perhaps more; and then turn coldly away, with the cruel word that I must win alone or perish?"

"It's not the same case at all," he remonstrated. "You're not fair to yourself. I'm a man."

"And I've called myself a woman," she replied. "After those weeks with you I thought myself no longer a shallow, unthinking girl. A woman! Now I see, Tom--I know! I have failed in the woman's part. But now I shall stand by you in your fight. I shall do my part, and you will win!"

Blake's eyes shone soft and blue, and he again held out his arms to her. But in the same moment the glow faded and his arms fell to his side.

"I almost forgot," he murmured. "You said that I must win by my own strength--that you must be sure of my strength."

"That was before I learned the truth," she replied. "I no longer ask so much. I shall--I must help you, as you helped me. I owe you life and more than life. You know that. You cannot think me so ungrateful as not to do all I can."

"No," he replied, with sudden resolve. "You are to do as you first said--as we agreed."

"You mean, not help you? But I must, Tom, now that I realize."

"All I want is another chance," he said. "It's more than I deserve. I can't accept still more."

"You'll not let me help you? Yet what the doctor said makes it all so different."

"Not to me," replied Blake, setting his jaw. "I've started in on this fight, and I'm going through with it the way I began. It'll be a big help to know how you feel now; but, just the same, I'm going to fight it out alone. The doctors may say what they please,--if I haven't will power enough to win, without being propped up, I'm not fit to marry any woman, much less you!"

"Tom!" she cried. "You _are_ the man I thought you. You _will_ win!"

She held out her hands to him. He took them in his big palms, and bent over to kiss her on the forehead.

"There!" he said, stepping away. "That's a lot more than I'm ent.i.tled to now, Jenny. It's time I left, to go and try to earn it."

"You won't allow me to help?" she begged.

"No," he answered, with a quiet firmness that she knew could not be shaken.

"At least you cannot keep me from praying for you," she said.

"That's true; and it will be a help to know how you feel about it now,"

he admitted.

"You will come again--soon?"

"No, not until I begin to see my way out on the Zariba Dam."

"Oh, that will be soon, I'm sure."

"I hope so. Good-bye!"

He turned and hurried from the room with an abruptness that in other circ.u.mstances she might have thought rude. But she understood. He was so determined in his purpose that he would not take the slightest risk that might be incurred by lingering.

She went to a front window, and watched him down the Drive. His step was quick but firm, and his head and shoulders were bent slightly forward, as if to meet and push through all obstacles.

CHAPTER XXV

HEAVY ODDS

For a few days Lord James was able to bring Genevieve encouraging reports of a vast improvement in Blake's spirits. But still the engineer-inventor failed to make the headway he had expected toward the solution of the complex and intricate problem of the dam. In consequence, he re-doubled his efforts and worked overtime, permitting himself less than four hours of sleep a night. His meals he either went without or took at his desk.

All the urgings of Griffith and Lord James could not induce him to cease driving himself to the very limit of endurance. Day by day he fell off, growing steadily thinner and more haggard and more feverish; yet still he toiled on, figuring and planning, planning and figuring.

But on the morning of the day set for Genevieve's ball, the weary, haggard worker tossed his pencil into the air, and uttered a shout that brought his two friends on a run from Griffith's office.

"I've got it! I've got it!" he flung at them, as they rushed in. He thrust a tablet across the table. "There's the proof. Check those totals, Grif."

Lord James leaned over the table to grasp Blake's hand.

"Gad, old man!" he said. "Just in time for you to go to the ball."

Griffith paused in his swift checking of Blake's final computations.

"Ball? Not on your sweet life! He's going to bed."

"You promised to go, Tom," said Lord James.

"Did I?" replied Blake. "Well, then, of course I'm going."

"Of course!" jeered Griffith. "It's no use arguing against a mule.

Can't help but wish you hadn't reminded him, Mr. Scarbridge."

"The change will do him good," argued Lord James.

"I'm in for it, anyway," said Blake. "Only thing, I wish I could get some sleep, in between. Well, here's for a good hot bath and a square meal. That'll set me up."

Griffith shook his head. "I'm not so sure. What you need is twelve hours on your back."

That he was right the Englishman had to admit himself with no little contrition before the ball was half over.

Blake presented a good figure, and though he talked little and danced less, yet on the whole he produced a very good impression. As Lord James had once observed, with regard to his visit at Ruthby Castle, Blake's bigness of mind seemed to be instinctively sensed by nearly all those with whom he came in contact on favorable terms.

But, from the first, he avoided Genevieve with a persistence so marked as almost to disarm Mrs. Gantry.